Landscape designer Chris Zaima incorporated a red bird house to add an Asian influence and to echo the red plantings around the pool.
Zaima softened the angular lines of the black Japanese-style entry gate with white wisteria in the summer and clematis in the fall.
Between the gate and the house, rhododendron planted by the owner 30 years ago have grown into a gigantic flowering mass that unifies the property.
Stones were selected in keeping with the poetic wabi-sabiworldview of finding beauty in nature’s irregularity and in the patina of age; conifer plantings retain shades of green for winter beauty.
At the original end of the garden, this curved plot featured an arrow-shaped stone lying on the ground pointing toward the pavilion. Zaima raised the rock to point to the heavens and considers it his “signature” stone.
Zaima created the first phase of the ongoing garden extension in this area where the stone wall represents the circle of life enclosing an orchard of 12 apple trees representing the months in four varieties (i.e., the seasons).
The limestone lantern from Pergola was created by New York artist Steve Karr; Zaima selected the low, flat rock to represent a tortoise—a Japanese symbol of longevity.
Originally a slope ringed by rhododendron, Zaima created a pavilion posed over a waterfall representing the myth of carp swimming upstream to be transformed into a dragon; steps leading to the pavilion represent the back of the dragon. Created by Dietter’s Water Gardens, the waterfall represents the mythological obstacle to fish swimming upstream while adding a contemplative background sound; koi were added to the pool.
Japanese pavilions are meant to be a place of concentration, a retreat from chaos to the serenity and tranquility of contemplation.
Antiqued wood floors give the feeling of age in this space.
Left open to incorporate the “borrowed scenery” of the distant hills, the pavilion is furnished in summer with chairs of Zaima’s design